<p>Theatre</a> & Dance Department :: University at Buffalo</p>
<p>BA and BFA degree options</p>
<p>A good friend of my daughter's is a freshman dance major at UB (with an Eastern Studies double major, I believe). She's an excellent dancer, and had many nice college opportunities to choose from. From what I've been told, the caliber of dancers in UB's program is very good.</p>
<p>As I understand it, the entire class of entering freshmen moves through the dance curriculum together. Two points this student's mom shared with me sounded less than ideal: no pointe until sophomore year (unfortunate considering her daughter's facility on pointe); and study abroad is difficult, since the dance major requires each class of dancers to study together as a unit.</p>
<p>I hope someone will correct me if I'm wrong!</p>
<p>I don't know much about the ballet portion of UB's dance program, but I believe the jazz and tap to be very strong. My d who is currently in a bfa musical theatre program took jazz and tap from Tom Ralabate when she was in high school. He taught at both UB and his sister's local studio (where my d took classes with more advanced local students and adults and college students). We also saw a few of UB's dance concerts and they were very good also. Although an MT major at her school, my D does very well in dance major classes at college partially as a result of taking classes from Tom Ralabate while in HS. He's very good as I assume the other dance profs are also. I assume he is still teaching there.</p>
<p>We visited UB for an audition for the Joffrey Summer SI. Tom Ralabate was one of the auditioners actually. The facilities are very nice, and the campus huge. My D really liked it there.</p>
<p>Upon talking to one of the other parents at the audition she said that her D attends a ballet school in the Buffalo area and that the directors of her D's ballet school have a D that attends UB as a dance major (contemporary I believe). However, the directors advised this woman that the ballet program at UB is not very good and that if their own D were interested in a ballet major they would not have sent her there but that for jazz, contemporary, and MT they are wonderful. This is all third hand ofc but nonetheless I feel like something to look into in case anyone was wondering.</p>
<p>Yes, as I said, I don't know much about the ballet portion of UB's dance program, but UB is very strong for jazz, tap and MT dance. My understanding is that of the SUNY schools, Brockport is the one to look at for ballet. I don't have personal experience but this is what I have been told by many. So if you are out there looking for a good ballet major - check out Brockport.</p>
<p>For ballet concentration you want SUNY Purchase. This is a very competitive program</p>